


Rumor has it

by craploadsofawesome



Category: Teenage Bounty Hunters (TV)
Genre: ????????, Angst, Character Study, Eventual Happy Ending, F/F, Mentions of Masturbation, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Romance, Self-Hatred, also april trying her best to be a good friend, also how extremely gay she is, just a brief study on what makes april april, loads of fluff, now also a Sterling character insight?, the first part is mostly very sad so apologies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26360539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/craploadsofawesome/pseuds/craploadsofawesome
Summary: She looks at the cross on the chain that Sterling is wearing and her first thought is Oh wow, that’s got to be illegal.Actually, scratch that. Her first thought is Sterling Wesley isn’t wearing a shirt. Followed by Sterling Wesley isn’t wearing a shirt in my car. Then, Sterling Wesley is shirtless in my car kissing me.Who gives a fuck about religion and God when this is the closest to divinity she’s ever felt?Or the story of how April and Sterling find their way away from and towards each other
Relationships: April Stevens/Sterling Wesley
Comments: 61
Kudos: 419





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All I have to say is, April Stevens is definitely the kind of girl who would make lists because she's a dumbass lesbian who does not know how to process the romantic advances of other girls.

April Stevens grows up surrounded by fire, brimstone and a disturbing amount of Biblical memorabilia. 

It takes her parents five tries to convince her about the legitimacy of the cross hanging on the wall. A session with the Pastor is scheduled every Sunday after Mass where she sits in his office and listens to him talk about how there was, in fact, a man who died for their sins and why they were supposed to read and follow the words he had said. She sits on his too-big chair, hands resting on the ornate arms, and kicks her feet into the air while she looks around at the walls and the windows and tries, very hard, to pay attention to what the weary man is telling her. 

“And that’s the Gospel truth,” he finishes, pointing to a particular passage, and April looks up at him. 

“But Pastor,” she frowns up at him after a moment. “How do we know?” 

“—how do we know what?” 

“That the son of God did say all this?” 

“Well, uh—” 

“Because, you see, yesterday Blair told Hannah G that she wasn’t at school because she was sick. And then Hannah G told Ezequiel that she had a sore throat. And Ezequiel told me and Hannah B that she had pneumonia and it was only when Sterling met me at lunch that she told me that it was—” 

“Child—” he starts in a tone that very much implies that he really should be getting paid for this. 

“What I mean is,” she continues “What if he said something else and they wrote something else down? Or what if he meant something else but they wrote down what they thought he meant instead?” 

An outside observer would look at the scene and laugh. There they sit, a 55-year-old man facing an 8-year-old child, both of them having equal and opposing expressions on their faces, neither of them willing to back down. 

The pastor sighs, after a minute of this. “You may leave, April.” 

She hops off the chair, smiles at him brightly (April Stevens may be a blasphemous child, but no one gets to say that she is a disrespectful and blasphemous child and that is something she is extremely proud of) and asks him if she’ll see him next Sunday. 

He hums in a way that is in no shape or form an affirmation but 8-year-old April takes it as one. Not like it matters to her. Sterling Wesley is waiting for her outside, probably playing with her annoying sister, and the day is overcast, but Sterling will make her feel bright. Sterling always makes her feel better. 

*****

Sterling was not making her feel especially better right now, though. 

“You need to listen to him, April,” she tells her, very seriously. “Mama tells me people who don’t believe go to Hell.” 

“And how do you know what hell is like?” 

Sterling widens her eyes, very seriously, and April wants to laugh. “You know it’s bad! We talked about it.” 

April wants to say _No, no we didn’t, your mother did at lunch yesterday_. Wants to ask her if she has never had any doubt about these things that the pastor, and her father, and her mother and almost everybody else keep talking about. But mostly, she wants to sit here on the park bench, holding onto Sterling’s right hand, and watching her smile. She wants to feel the weight of Sterling’s head on her shoulder and the comfort of her starchy cotton frock on her arm. She may only be 8, but she knows what love is, and love for her, is Sterling Wesley. 

And that is why she won’t argue after this. Sterling can believe in the Bible all she wants; April won’t say a thing. If there is a God out there somewhere, (and she is convinced there is, just not in worn pages full of undecipherable scripts and texts) they exist wherever she feels the happiest. And she may only be 8, but she knows what happiness is, and happiness for her, is Sterling Wesley. 

April Stevens grows up having decided that the only religion she believes in, is Sterling. 

*****

April thinks _This is it. This is the last time. The last Adele ever_. Every single time. 

It isn’t. 

After Adele comes Riley. Then Eliza. Then Kayla. A tearful goodbye, a tantrum, hundreds of scratched out words on crumpled up letters that nobody apart from Chessur gets to witness. Every girl a different tragedy. 

And here’s the thing. She’s learned how to keep it a secret. She has to. Her father walks around the house most days screaming about how the country is corrupted by the heathens and the deviants. On the days that he isn’t outright angry, it is vitriol veiled as a healthy debate that he spills during family dinners with the neighbors over. _Of course they think they’re, you know, that way, Brandon. They’re all lost, those poor children. Led astray with all the propaganda you see on the internet these days. Doesn’t mean they’re right. What, soon, they’ll be asking to raise children with other deviants? This country can’t let that happen, surely. We, the good Christians, can’t let that happen. You know that._

April knows. She knows a lot of things. 

For example, the fact that her father comes home drunk every Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and he has a specific ritual for all those days. Fridays are when she lays out two glasses of water on the dining table with an Advil next to them. Saturdays are for picking him off the porch and helping him to the couch, for taking off his shoes and covering him with a blanket while he rants incoherently about how the bastards at work are hellbent on ruining his life by promoting all those “bloody career women” above him. And Sundays are for locking herself up in her room with Chessur in her arms and Green Day blaring in her ears so she doesn’t have to hear her parents scream at each other for hours and hours. 

So nobody has to know if she spends most of her childhood making deals with whoever’s up there. _If I could just get to hold a girl once, it’ll be fine. If I could get to kiss her, it would be enough. Is it okay if I have a girlfriend for a week if I promise to ultimately marry a man? A month? A year? Is it still okay if I want to be with her forever? Would I still be okay? Would you hate me?_ Nobody gets to know about all the eBooks she illegally downloads so she can read about women falling in love. They do not get to see her cry. This world has seen enough of her already. 

By the time April turns 16, she knows that there is no last time anymore. 

*****

There are two things April is in awe of, the power of rumors, and the general ability of Sterling Wesley to slide her way out of tight spots. 

(If the words _Sterling, slide_ and _tight spot_ together make her skin go hot, she ignores it.) 

The condom is a shitty move, but she watches as Sterling makes her way out of it with at least half of her dignity intact. April does get the satisfaction of kicking her out of her own club but it doesn’t make her feel any better. Doesn’t take away the empty feeling in her stomach. 

It doesn’t give her any sort of satisfaction, because at the end of the day, she knows it is all misdirected anger. Lord knows she hasn’t yet found a good way to express _I hate you for letting me go and making me feel like I never mattered all these years_ , and _I hate you because you make me feel embarrassed because you were the only_ _person I_ _ever cared about_ _and_ _you_ _don’t even think about me_ . Sterling has no idea how badly she wants to go up to her and grab her by the shoulders and scream _I hate you, I hate you, I hate that stupid condom because it’s a reminder of the fact that someone else has touched you and known you_ and _I hate your stupid, pretty face and your stupid, shiny blonde hair and your stupid fucking lips so, so much_. 

“You know you can talk to us about anything, right?” Ezequiel says, quietly, as she finishes ranting once more about Sterling Fucking Wesley and how to undermine her eulogy event best. Hannah is sitting next to him, nodding solemnly. 

And April blinks, thinks, panics. “What would I talk to you about?” 

“Just. Whatever,” he tells her, in that wise, old tone he often adopts while talking about Beyonce, or Cowboy boots, and for a minute, she wants to tell them everything. Hannah may be ditzy, but she is one of her closest friends and usually the first one to know when she’s feeling off. And there’s Ezequiel. The boy who she’s punched Senior jocks for, who she would protect from homophobes and bullies till her dying day. They are the best friends she could ever have asked for. As the people closest to her, they are usually the first in the line of fire when she explodes. 

(Because that’s the thing about hating yourself that much. It turns outwards eventually.) 

For a minute, she looks at them and feels so grateful for them that she could cry. For a minute, she thinks, as she so often has before, that she could tell them. It wouldn’t be a big deal. It would be nothing. 

Except. All it takes is one rumor. 

It would be everything. 

She shrugs and breaks the moment instead. “Hey, how much do you think she’ll hate me if I turn up in a black dress and a heavy veil and start sobbing loudly?” 

Ezequiel sighs. 

*****

A list of things Sterling doesn’t get to know, ever: 

  * How good it feels to get it all out after Forensics. About the massive wave roaring in her chest, overflowing in a great tidal pouring of words and phrases and the sheer relief of _Now you know. This is why I am the way I am. Do you see now? Do you see me?_



And she walks away her blood running in her ears, still angry but also feeling strangely happy at having gotten all of it off her chest. She walks away with the feel of Sterling’s arm, wrapped in her shirt, still on her hand. 

(If later that night, she touches herself under the covers and thinks about the look on Sterling’s face, thinks about grabbing at her bare arm anywhere that is not the crowded hallway and comes at the thought of Sterling right above her, face scrunched up in pleasure, mouth twisted with the remnants of April’s name, it’s a secret she can keep.) 

  * The amount of effort it takes to not lean into Sterling’s warmth when they’re around each other. 



She’s been weirdly nice ever since the day of the debate. Nice, and giggly? Here’s a list of all the strange things she has done ever since April walked into the class and sat next to her: 

  * Stolen looks at her. All throughout class. And then the next day when they sat together and finished out a rough plan of their project. She can feel Sterling’s eyes on her like a giant bulls-eye, and it makes her feel exposed. Vulnerable. 



  * Twirled her hair about twice every hour. It’s awfully distracting. Plus, every time she does that, the air around her fills up with the scent of her vanilla-flavored shampoo, and April has to resist the very strong urge to take in a deep breath and smile.


  * Talked about Naomi and Ruth? That’s. It’s. Never mind. 


  * Said “I’ll walk you out”, after they were done with the structure. And then shrugged when April had frowned at her. 



And then they had walked from the Wesley’s dining room out into to their drawing room, and then somehow spent an hour just walking in the garden? If April concentrates hard enough, she can still feel Sterling’s shoulder brushing up against hers, can still hear her talking about her dog Chloe, can still press her hand up to her heart and feel it speed up at the memory. 

(If she concentrates even harder, she can see the image her traitorous heart had conjured up for her — of April and Sterling walking with their hands entangled. Maybe with her head resting on Sterling’s shoulder and Sterling’s arm stretched out across her back. A smile directed right at her. A fleeting kiss goodbye.) 

It was just a walk. It wasn’t just a walk. 

  * How close she is to passing out when she turns away after Sterling kisses her. 



Three words. Simple enough. Sterling kissed her. Sterling kissed her. Sterling. Kissed. April. 

If she is still breathing, she has no idea how. Her mind is a complete blank, coherent-thought wise. She has a faint memory of ranting about her father lying and how she was so sick of people not telling the truth, and then, well, you know. 

Sterling kissed her. 

And now there’s this enormous roaring in her ears, of her heart tripping and scrambling and running and jumping. There is confetti exploding in the pit of her stomach. Her legs aren’t connected to her brain anymore. Neither are her hands, which are trembling. She stares at them, only dimly registering Sterling’s (sweet, soft) voice apologizing profusely behind her. April has no idea what she’s apologizing for. For giving her the best kiss of her life? For making her feel alive the first time in this miserable existence? 

She stares at her hands, then at the door. She could do this. Walk out. Never look at Sterling again. Try to forget the entire thing and chalk it up to a fever dream. She could still go back to her shiny, happy, filled-with-Biblical-memorabilia life, to her Straight-Straight alliance. She would be safe. 

Or she could walk back to the girl who she’s been crazy about since the beginning of time. 

It’s supposed to be a choice. In the end, it really isn’t one at all. 

Because April Stevens may have grown up surrounded by fire and brimstone but for the first time in her life, she knew what ice tasted like. 

*****

She looks at the cross on the chain that Sterling is wearing and her first thought is _Oh wow, that’s got to be illegal_. 

Actually, scratch that. Her first thought is _Sterling Wesley isn’t wearing a shirt_ . Followed by _Sterling Wesley isn’t wearing a shirt in my car._ Then _, Sterling Wesley is shirtless in my car kissing me_. 

Who even gives a fuck about religion and God when this is the closest to divinity she’s ever felt? 

Sterling kisses like she’s driving a car. Starts off slow, until April can barely stand it anymore, and then she turns it up so smooth that all the oxygen runs out of the space and April can’t breathe. But this is the best kind of breathlessness, the best kind of pain in her chest. This, Sterling in her arms, is the best thing in the world. 

April wonders how she’s ever gone this long without her. She wonders how she’ll go back to the way things were when Sterling eventually leaves. 

“God,” she breathes out. “I have this intense urge to just — ravage you.” 

Sterling stares at her, half of her face covered in the dark and April feels the sharp sting of embarrassment creep up on her. 

“Um,” she continues, hand coming up to cover her eyes. “That was too much. I’m sorry.” 

There’s a pause. 

“No, no, you can do that,” Sterling says, and oh. 

“Oh.” 

“Yeah,” she can hear the smile in Sterling’s voice now, even through her covered eyes “Hey April?” 

“Yes, Sterling?” 

April feels Sterling’s fingers on her hand, before she hears her speak. “Don’t — don’t hide? You’re pretty. I’d like to look at your face.” 

_Oh, that’s_ _gotta_ _be illegal_ , she thinks again, but she lets Sterling kiss her into distraction anyways. 

*****

Here is how you ruin a life: a comprehensive guide by April Stevens. 

First, you accidentally get born into a high-class, Southern, Republican family, to a father who gets drunk and screams and beats up sex workers and to a mother who you cannot remember ever hugging you. Then, you meet the girl of your dreams when you are five, and cut off ties with her when you are ten. Then, you spend all of your middle school and half of your high school years loathing and hating yourself and her to a point where you don’t realize that you’re fucking up in some very idiotic ways. Then, you kiss her back. 

Then you let your father scare you into letting her go. 

She sits across from him at the dinner table while he holds her mother and her hands in his. Promises to set everything straight. Tells them it’s all going to be alright now. He’s back, he says to his girls, back for good. And he’s going to get everyone who landed him in jail. Get them good. 

April stares at her hands. This is all she’s ever wanted in her life, for someone to touch her with care. She’s looked for it from her parents, from her friends, from all the Adeles there have been over the year, and now that it’s here, she feels numb. Empty comfort, that’s all it is. Sterling flashes to her mind, and she feels a sharp sting of yearning so bad she thinks she’ll lose it right then and there. 

Rumors, rumors. It all comes down to rumors. 

Here is how you ruin a life: You are born as April Stevens. Because everyone else is going to do it for you either way. 

*****

“I just — I can’t,” she says, and breaks both of their hearts. 

Sterling reaches forward to kiss her again, and she turns away. Again. 

“Maybe someday?” she asks, in the end, and this is so stupid. Stupid and unfair. It is unfair of her to say that to Sterling. Unfair of her to expect her to wait around for her. And yet, the thought of letting her go just like this seems utterly agonizing. 

_I’m sorry_ , she thinks, desperately. _I’m so, so sorry, Sterling_. 

“Yeah, maybe,” Sterling replies, sounding like she’s far away. “Actually, I don’t know.” 

She looks so tiny sitting beside her. A few inches, a thousand miles. All April wants to do is slide over to her and wrap her arms around her so tight that there’s no space for air between them. She wants, so badly, to walk inside and hold her hand, and kiss her and sleep next to her at the Lock-in. Wants to do stupid things that kiss her hair at school, and stare at her, lovestruck as they sit in class next to each other. Wants to love her the way she deserves to be loved. 

Instead, she takes one last look at the girl of her dreams sitting on a park bench under the streetlight, and walks away. 

Turns out fire burns even worse after you’ve known the comfort of ice. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second part!  
> Really also wanted to capture Sterling's voice a little and I kinda just rolled with it.  
> Also, Sterling Wesley? Also a list making disaster bi

The worst thing, Sterling thinks, about being kidnapped by her mother’s twin sister, discovering that aforementioned twin was actually her biological mother, and being broken up with by her lifelong-nemesis-turned-secret-paramour, all within the span of one night, is that Blair isn’t the center of attention anymore. 

Nobody is taking it well. 

She sits on her bed, wrapped in a blanket, and stares blankly at the family photo hanging on the wall opposite to hers. Four people. Two of them apparently loaded with more secrets than anybody could have ever imagined. They look so happy. She’s looked at it for as long as she can remember, has laughed over how she’d been cursed with her dad’s receding hairline, or how she and Blair both have the same Twin Glow. Now all she can see are the differences. What parts of her are manufactured? What parts are real? How is she supposed to be able to tell them apart? 

Is she supposed to be able to tell them apart? 

She can see Blair in her peripheral vision, bouncing her legs erratically, to deal with— 

(What is it that they’re dealing with? Right. Trauma. Secret family. Trauma. Heartache. 

Trauma.) 

Blair curses, and then there’s the pressure of hands on her shoulders. She looks up into her sister’s (cousin, now) eyes. 

_Tell me we’re okay_ , Blair’s eyes ask, desperate. _You’re still my sister, okay? I don’t care what they all say. Fuck them._

Sterling’s just tired. She looks blankly back at Blair, nods. It has to be enough. 

It isn’t. 

*****

Bowser finds her sitting behind Yogurtopia a week later and joins her. There has been no bounty hunting since a week. To be honest, there hasn’t been much of anything. Her mother (her aunt) called her in sick for a week. Guess there’s no good way to say there’s been a kidnapping in the family without inviting questions. Blair’s been bringing back her homework every day, depositing it on top of her table without conversation. The days are breakfast, lunch, schoolwork, and dinner with the weight of undiscussed matters hanging over every minute like static from a broken radio. Bearable as long as someone’s talking. 

Their parents haven’t run out of things to say. None of those things are remotely what Sterling needs to hear. 

(That’s okay though. She’d rather hear white noise than the absence of Blair’s voice.) 

He speaks after a while. “How ya doin’, kid?” 

“Peachy.” 

“I’ve been worried. You girls haven’t been......whaddaya call it? Streaking since a while.” 

She chokes on air before it hits her “You mean snapchat, Bowsy. Snap streaks.” 

“Oh, yeah, that.” They had made him install Snapchat a month back. He’d agreed very grumpily. 

“Yeah, well,” he continued. “Kinda miss it.” 

It makes her smile for the first time in what feels like forever. 

“We miss you too, Bowsy,” she nudges at his arm. 

“Oh, no, you’re the only one who does. The other one’s here almost every day after school.” 

That is news to her. “She is?” 

He hums, lets it rest in the air before opening his mouth again. “She cries sometimes, your sister does.” 

What hits first, surprisingly, isn’t the urge to correct him by telling him Blair’s actually her cousin. It’s that bolt of sorrow to her chest. Blair isn’t supposed to cry without Sterling knowing. Isn’t supposed to be sad when Sterling can’t do anything about it. 

Blair isn’t supposed to cry alone. 

He ruffles her hair, and they go back to sitting in silence. It doesn’t feel that loud anymore. 

*****

The road to recovery, like Luke’s dick, is long and hard. 

“Oh my God, Blair, can you not?” 

Blair laughs. It makes Sterling happy. And yes, while rather crass, and potentially inaccurate (Sterling isn’t one to kiss and tell), the statement is true. Recovery is taking one step in sand, the next in water all while clad in heels. It is multiple sessions in therapy, some alone, some with Debbie, some with Blair. It is awkward-yet-slowly-turning-normal conversations with her father while he putters about making wooden elephants for her. It is long, long hours sitting with Debbie, trying to convince her tongue that the word “Mom” shouldn’t be foreign to it. It is winding down for the day by laughing all of it off with Blair lying next to her. 

Recovery is long. And hard. And completely worth it. 

All of this doesn’t leave a lot of time for thinking about irrelevant things like lock-ins and criminal acquaintances and girls who kiss like they’ve been waiting for it forever. It’s natural that in all this shit, April doesn’t cross her mind very often. In fact— 

“Yeah, you gotta try harder than that.” 

“Blair!” 

“I’m not the one making ten playlists one after the other crying about how badly you miss April and want her back, Sterls. That particular dumbass is all you.” 

“I don’t—” 

“—try again.” 

“—miss April—” 

“—uh huh.” 

“—or want her back!” 

Blair looks deep into her eyes. _You do_ , she thinks. 

_I don’t_ , Sterling thinks back. 

She doesn’t. 

(She does.) 

“Shut up,” she says aloud. It works on Blair. It doesn’t work on the annoying voice in her head. 

*****

A long, long time ago, back when Sterling and April were seven, were two girls holding hands on swings and saving each other seats in school, they got into trouble. Now, children get into trouble, as they are so often inclined to do, except Sterling wasn’t really used to it. Blair was the child running up and down aisles noisily and climbing up trees. Sterling, on the other hand, was more the waiting down in case of accidental crashing sort. 

This particular incident involved a burning candle, an elaborate candle-holder in the shape of an angel, and a mildly burnt forearm that belonged to April. Two tearful faces and five concerned scolding fits later, they stood side by side, Sterling gently holding onto April’s finger so as to not hurt her more, and faced a roomful of angry adults (and one very impressed Blair) who wanted to know whose idea it had been. 

April and Sterling got into a fight, because they couldn’t decide who could scream “I did it” the loudest. 

Sterling doesn’t remember this story. April will tell it to her, a long, long time from right now, and this will be one of those stories they would kiss each other over as they sit by the fire with their cat purring beside them. They would however disagree over the implicit message. 

April Stevens tells the truth and does the right thing. Except when it comes to Sterling. 

Sterling Wesley doesn’t get into trouble. Except when it comes down to protecting April Stevens. 

Love had made them the exceptions to the other’s rules a long, long time before they had even known what it was. 

At 16, unaware of all of this, she watches April disappear into the janitor’s closet and decides to follow her in, because when it comes to protecting April, there are really no two ways about it. 

*****

April cannot breathe. 

April cannot breathe and Sterling is panicking. 

“Go,” April takes one look at her and says. Her breathing is labored, harsh in the silence of school after hours. “Sterling, go away.” 

“I,” she starts, stammers out. “You’re not okay.” 

“Sterling, go. You don’t have to be here for this.” 

Sterling is not going and she will definitely be here for this. Her head is completely blank and she hates it. Oh, a random fact about otters or cows or guns? Sure, it can deliver that to her in a minute. And yet, absolutely blank when it comes to something useful, like dealing with panic attacks. 

Fortunately, April isn’t as useless as she is, apparently. Or she’s just had a lot of experience with it. Sterling can hear her murmuring what sounds like numbers, as her breathing slowly goes from labored to a deep even. That is when she realizes she’s been holding in her own for a while. 

“I’m sorry,” April says, after a while. 

Sterling bites her tongue on potential responses — _What, No, Why,_ _That’s_ _crazy,_ _Please_ _don’t_ — and takes a deep breath. “You don’t have to be.” 

“You shouldn’t have had to see that. Or to be here,” April runs a hand through her hair, frustrated. “Not after — not after what I did.” 

Oh. They’re going there. Sterling really doesn’t want to go there. 

She shakes her head, digs into her bag and brings out her bottle instead of replying to that. Offers it up to April, who takes a quick gulp, not caring about the way the water drips down the front of her shirt. 

(Sterling hates to admit it, but she cares. A lot.) 

“Come here often?” she says, both trying to lighten the mood and drive the thought of April Stevens in a wet shirt, water running down her neck, out of her mind. 

“Every day after school, actually.” 

Huh. “Really?” 

“Yeah,” April’s mouth twists into a grimace. “Now that my dad’s back, I’m trying my very hardest to not be in the house when he might be.” 

Right. Now that was a whole other thing she didn’t want to think about. 

“Wait. You sit here alone?” 

April shrugs, and to Sterling, it says a lot of things. It says _It’s_ _okay_ .Says _I’m used to it_. Asks _Am I not always alone_? 

Sterling looks at her, standing there with her arms wrapped around herself, looking smaller than she already is and has the strangest urge to walk forward and wrap her up in a hug. April looks up and she smiles. Hopes April can read what the smile says. 

_Not if I can help it._

*****

Here is a list of the top five most ridiculous excuses Sterling has come up with in the past month just to get to spend time with April in a closet: 

  * The smell of disinfectant is conducive to her homework-doing process 
  * The dim room was an excellent place to nap in 
  * It’s the only place Luke can’t find her in 
  * Her chakra seems aligned in the closet 
  * The sight of half-filled paint boxes is aesthetically pleasing 



And here is a list of things Blair has accused her of in the past month every time she has been late to a stakeout: 

  * Of having a tiny crush on April 
  * Of having a massive crush on April 
  * Of wanting to hold her hand and kiss her cheek and stare at her with hearts in her eyes 
  * Of being a little (a lot) in love with her 
  * Of being a complete idiot 



Sterling will only admit to the last one. 

*****

The road to love is about as long as the distance from one corner of a closet to another. It is measured in the gummy bears that Sterling spends half an hour dividing into green, red and yellow just because April hates the sight of the yellow ones. It is counted in the number of songs that can fit in the hour in which she sits next to April, listening through one earphone each, the feel of April’s arm brushing against hers. It has as many road signs as the number of times Sterling thinks _Oh, I could fake a yawn and slide my arm around her shoulder_ , thinks _Oh_ _, if I turn my head to the right, we’d be within kissing distance_ , thinks _If I stay a minute longer, I won’t be able to leave_. Has exactly as many detours as the number of times she says something instead of saying what she really wants to. 

Here, have this chocolate that I accidentally found in my bag because you’re too absent-minded to eat on time ( _I have all your favorite things in my bag. I wish you’d eat better_ ) 

You drool when you sleep ( _I wish you’d fall asleep on my shoulder_ ) 

You suck ( _I can’t stop thinking about you_ ) 

I’m too lazy to get up ( _I don’t want to let you go_ ) 

I’ll see you tomorrow ( _I can’t wait_ ) 

April ( _Baby. Darling. Sweetheart_ ) 

20 square feet. Two girls who start by sitting on opposite ends, too afraid of looking each other in the eye, and end up sitting side by side. 

The road to love is on fire. It makes her feel alive. 

*****

There are few things faster than the following: Luke when he wants find her after the word Prom is involved, rumors, rushing, flying, soaring through the hallways and April running off to jump to conclusions. 

“Okay, so wait,” Bowser raises a finger, frowns so hard it looks like he’s going to pop a vessel. “So this girl broke up with you. Then you kissed your ex-boyfriend. Then you avoided him. And then you spent the past two months with this girl. And somehow neglected to mention the kiss. And now she’s found out because the boy asked you to prom and is mad.” 

He looks so confused, wrapped up in teenage drama. Sterling thinks, not for the first time _Oh,_ _Bowsy_. 

Blair clears her throat from the backseat, and raises a finger too. 

(Yes, that one) 

“Both of you are the worst.” 

“Hey,” Sterling protests, half-heartedly. 

“Okay, number one. I don’t know why she’s mad. She broke up with you—” 

“—actually—” 

“—but then, ah, right. You did try to ram her out of the closet.” 

“—I was just—” 

“—wait, but then. Even with all of this, you can’t find her for five minutes to explain your side? Epic love confession involved?” 

Sterling groans “You think Bowser’s good at avoiding Yolanda?” Bowser says a muffled “Hey!” that both she and Blair ignore. “April is the master. No reply to my multiple texts. She’s in and out of class like a bat. Her friends won’t let me see her. Literally! Ezequiel sits in lunch in a cape and dark sunglasses because he really “digs the bodyguard aesthetic”. How am I supposed to talk to her?” 

_That sucks_ , Blair thinks at her. It does. Missing April isn’t a sting, it’s a continuously bleeding wound in her chest. It is sleeplessness, and lack of hunger and no strength in her bones. It is random tears in the middle of dinner, pain every time she opens up her phone to an overwhelming lack of texts. Missing April is everything. 

“That said, though,” she starts again, after the morose pause “I do have a plan.” 

Blair squints at her. “Is it a fun plan?” 

“It involves kidnapping.” 

“Cheers to that. 

Bowser blinks. He looks so done. 

*****

  * Talking to Luke for over an hour, sitting with him as he cries and apologizing multiple times for leading him on? Check 
  * Sneaking Bowser into their school so he can help her set things up? Check 
  * Getting Blair to evil-eye April into listening to her and following her out of Prom to a secondary location? Check 
  * Looking fabulous? Uh— 



“Oh,” April says, as soon as she enters the door and sees her. Sterling fiddles with her hands, feeling a little exposed with the very slinky blue dress than Blair had picked out for her, insisting that there needed to be at least a little bit of seduction involved. “Oh. You look—” 

She trails off, but the look in her eyes stays. 

(Check) 

“Do you like it? It’s Prom in a closet! No commitments, no public declarations. Just two girls. In a. Closet. Doing their own Prom.” Sterling waves a hand in the air, pointing to nothing in specific, and watches April take it all in; the lights strung up on the shelves, balloons covering the floor, the rose in her hand, and (and this was something Sterling considered her masterstroke) a tiny mirror ball Bowser had somehow managed to fix on to the ceiling which was now rotating slowly, throwing silver light everywhere in the confined space. Everywhere. 

(It was making her head hurt) 

“Actually, can I switch this off? My head feels wonky.” 

April laughs. Sterling feels warm again. 

*****

April apologizes for overreacting the same time Sterling apologizes for not telling her about Luke sooner. 

“No, I,” April stammers, patting the front of her dress nervously. “I fucked up. You owed me nothing. I just. I just freaked out.” 

Sterling reaches out to grab her hand, stilling it, and holds it in hers. She has no idea where this new-found confidence is coming from. There’s just something about April (tiny, sweet, vulnerable April) standing below the lights that makes her want to reach out and hold her. 

(Kiss her lips, too, but she shuts it down. The thought makes her entire body go hot all over.) 

“Why did you?” 

April looks up at her, and her heart does a tiny hop-skip-jump inside her chest. “You know why.” 

_(Bam-Bam)_

“You have to say it.” 

April kisses her instead. 

( _Bam-Bam-Bam-Bam_ ) 

There is a time for a grand declaration of love. If Sterling thinks hard enough, she can still recall her original speech. Something along the lines of _Hey April, I think you look_ _gorgeous and you do something to my insides because they feel like they’re melting, like all the time_ and _Hey April, I think the two of us together would be amazing_ and _Hey April, I th_ _ink I’ve been walking through life just being comfortable and beige and you, you set me on fire, you make me feel like I’ve just been woken up with a splash of gasoline to my face_ _. You make me feel like I’m both the balloon and the string that grounds it,_ _both the kid climbing up a fence and the kid waiting patiently on the other side_. What she means to say is _April, April, April_ _, you scare me and turns out I love_ _the taste of_ _adrenaline_. 

(April, I think I’m falling in love with you) 

“You’re an idiot,” April tells her after, when they’re just standing there, forehead pressed to forehead, breathing the same air, hearts running a marathon, and Sterling knows what she really wants to say. 

She takes another deep breath and leans in to kiss April again. After all, there is a time for a grand declaration of love. She’s willing to wait for it. They’ve got all the time in the world. 

*****

The best thing, Sterling discovers, about having a private Prom, getting the girl, and Blair somehow winning Prom Queen when she wasn’t even in the running, all within the span of one night, is that Blair is the center of attention again. 

At midnight, when everything’s winding down, Sterling stands arm-in-arm with Blair and Miles, makes eye contact with a smiling April from across the parking lot, and decides that they’re all taking it pretty well. 

**Author's Note:**

> If you wanna generally scream over random fandoms, on tumblr, hit me up [here](https://thedistrictsleepsalonetonight.tumblr.com/)


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